If Only

[mishalak]

"If only, if only," the woodpecker sighs,
"The bark on the tree was as soft as the skies"
While the wolf waits below, hungry and lonely,
Crying to the moon,
"If only, if only."

If only, if only, the moon speaks no reply;
Reflecting the sun and all that's gone by.
Be strong, my weary wolf, turn around boldly.
Fly high, my baby bird,
My angel, my only.
~Louis Sacher
 

Comments

[ajournalguy.livejournal.com]

I only recently read Holes, though I'd been meaning to for quite some time. Everything fits together perfectly, whihc, depending on your point of view, makes it an example of excellent novel-writing, or extremely poor novel-writing.

I found that I had the Pig Song stuck in my head for weeks after, and it still pops into my mind occasionally.

My favorite bit of verse out of a novel still comes from Ursula K. Le Guin, though:

Only in silence the word,
only in dark the light,
only in dying life:
bright the hawk's flight
on the empty sky.

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

For some kinds of novel it hurts. When it isn't already established that this is the kind of world where sometimes everything works out just right. Or if magic isn't real. When magic is real it often feels exactly right that everything comes together eventually.

For no curse will last forever, even death may not mean never, and every lonely river - winds somewhere safely to the sea.